# Possible food substitute **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [May 6, 2014, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808 "2014-05-06T15:05:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Flyer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/flyer/32/7298_2.png) [@Flyer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flyer)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/1 "2014-05-06T15:05:22Z")
I stumbled across this _New Yorker_ article and found it fascinating. If this works out, we just might – might – have a functional equivalent of the SF “meal in a pill.” > [@](#): > > Rhinehart, who is twenty-five, studied electrical engineering at Georgia Tech, and he began to consider food as an engineering problem. “You need amino acids and lipids, not milk itself,” he said. “You need carbohydrates, not bread.” Fruits and vegetables provide essential vitamins and minerals, but they’re “mostly water.” He began to think that food was an inefficient way of getting what he needed to survive. “It just seemed like a system that’s too complex and too expensive and too fragile,” he told me. > [@](#): > > In the formula that he and his teammates have settled on, the major food groups are all accounted for: the lipids come from canola oil; the carbohydrates from maltodextrin and oat flour; and the protein from rice. To that, they’ve added fish oil (for omega-3s; vegans can substitute flaxseed oil), and doses of various vitamins and minerals: magnesium, calcium, electrolytes. Rhinehart is reluctant to associate Soylent with any flavor, so for now it just contains a small amount of sucralose, to mask the taste of the vitamins. > **[The End of Food](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/05/12/the-end-of-food?currentPage=all)** > > Has a tech entrepreneur come up with a product to replace our meals? ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/2 "2014-05-06T15:25:51Z")
Except it isn’t a “meal in a pill”, because that is impossible. The nutrients in food are mostly macronutrients–protein, carbohydrates, lipids, fiber, and water. You can’t compress these things into a pill like you can with micronutrients (ie vitamins and minerals), you need them in bulk. Yeah, you can make a food bar or a food slurry that people can choke down instead of eating. That’s not a food pill. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/3 "2014-05-06T15:29:41Z")
Who wants a food pill anyway? They’ve been talking about this since I was a kid. Who wants to replace life’s second greatest pleasure with a pill? ---
**Author:** ![Foggy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foggy/32/1082_2.png) [@Foggy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Foggy)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/4 "2014-05-06T15:33:21Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Who wants a food pill anyway? They’ve been talking about this since I was a kid. Who wants to replace life’s second greatest pleasure with a pill? I would for a number of reasons, but then I’m weird.😉 ---
**Author:** ![Renee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/renee/32/287_2.png) [@Renee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Renee)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/5 "2014-05-06T15:46:51Z")
> [@](#): > > In the formula that he and his teammates have settled on, the major food groups are all accounted for: the lipids come from canola oil; the carbohydrates from maltodextrin and oat flour; and the protein from rice. To that, they’ve added fish oil (for omega-3s; vegans can substitute flaxseed oil), and doses of various vitamins and minerals: magnesium, calcium, electrolytes. Rhinehart is reluctant to associate Soylent with any flavor, so for now it just contains a small amount of sucralose, to mask the taste of the vitamins. Sounds delicious. ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/6 "2014-05-06T15:57:21Z")
I forget where I read a review of it - possibly on Lifehacker - but the reviewer said the appearance and consistency made it hard to visualize anything other than you were about to chug a big glass full of semen. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/7 "2014-05-06T18:51:02Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Who wants a food pill anyway? They’ve been talking about this since I was a kid. Who wants to replace life’s second greatest pleasure with a pill? Exactly. The tiny minority of people who find such an idea attractive seem to think it’s a solution to a terrible problem shared by everyone. Weird. ---
**Author:** ![Doctor\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doctor_jackson/32/32_2.png) [@Doctor\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doctor_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/8 "2014-05-06T19:19:54Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Who wants a food pill anyway? They’ve been talking about this since I was a kid. Who wants to replace life’s second greatest pleasure with a pill? Actually, they did develop a pill for the first greatest pleasure - and it helped usher in the sexual revolution! Can you imagine if the same thing happened with food? Why, we’d be eating indescriminately with people we barely know while shouting “Make carbs, not war!” - everybody hauling off to Foodstock and dropping amino acid! I was a child of the 60’s. Literally. As in too young to take part. This could be my chance to participate! Don’t throw fish oil on my parade… ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/9 "2014-05-06T19:50:50Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > I forget where I read a review of it - possibly on Lifehacker - but the reviewer said the appearance and consistency made it hard to visualize anything other than you were about to chug a big glass full of semen. “Have you ever had Creamy Wheat?” ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/10 "2014-05-06T20:12:08Z")
I don’t want to appeal to stereotyping. But only an engineer would think of food as a problem that needs to be solved. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/11 "2014-05-06T21:45:34Z")
> [@Doctor\_Jackson](#): > > Actually, they did develop a pill for the first greatest pleasure - and it helped usher in the sexual revolution! Can you imagine if the same thing happened with food? Why, we’d be eating indescriminately with people we barely know while shouting “Make carbs, not war!” - everybody hauling off to Foodstock and dropping amino acid! > > I was a child of the 60’s. Literally. As in too young to take part. This could be my chance to participate! Don’t throw fish oil on my parade… I’m all for that kind of pill. This one just doesn’t sound like it’s the right kind. ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/12 "2014-05-06T21:49:34Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > I don’t want to appeal to stereotyping. But only an engineer would think of food as a problem that needs to be solved. Concur with bells on. ---
**Author:** ![Sr\_Siete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@Sr\_Siete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sr_Siete)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/13 "2014-05-06T21:59:08Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > Exactly. The tiny minority of people who find such an idea attractive seem to think it’s a solution to a terrible problem shared by everyone. Weird. It is a solution to a lot of terrible issues, though. Allowing starving groups of people to survive, for one. Imagine how much easier it would be to bring as many nutrients as the human body need to a refugee camp. Also, I could talk about the whole ecological disaster caused by extensive farming and the waste it generates, but that’d probably make me sound like some sort of hippie. ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/14 "2014-05-06T22:11:06Z")
We already have stuff like [Plumpy’nut](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plumpy%27nut) for refugee camps and the like. And yes, farming causes ecological issues, but I’m not sure how you propose to make a “food pill” that doesn’t have similar effects on the environment, without the use of magic or science fiction. ---
**Author:** ![Sr\_Siete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@Sr\_Siete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sr_Siete)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2014, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/15 "2014-05-06T22:22:26Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > We already have stuff like [Plumpy’nut](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plumpy%27nut) for refugee camps and the like. And yes, farming causes ecological issues, but I’m not sure how you propose to make a “food pill” that doesn’t have similar effects on the environment, without the use of magic or science fiction. Well, then another brand of a different type of plumpy’nut-like substance can hardly do any harm, can it? It may be even more efficient, for all we know. And obviously, requiring lesser quantities extracted from a limited amount of resources would curb farming quite a lot. Well, it could make it potentially a negligible fraction. ---
**Author:** ![Isilder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/cc9497/32.png) [@Isilder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isilder)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/16 "2014-05-07T00:47:18Z")
Its just a muesli bar. I can see that there is a supermarket full of different types of “nourishing and slightly nutritious stuff” not far from here, but there is no famine on the continent ! The grain based breakfast foods and bars are fortified, and coloured, with vitamins , soaked in oil and covered with dairy product already… With the sucrose/glucode, the food has short, medium and long term energy, so the patient gets some energy to survive the next few hours and survive the night as well… (If all the energy came from sugar, it would be all consumed too quick - the child may become hyperactive and use it all up !. If it was only grain meal or kernels the energy may take too long to digest … ) ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/17 "2014-05-07T02:02:16Z")
> [@Sr\_Siete](#): > > And obviously, requiring lesser quantities extracted from a limited amount of resources would curb farming quite a lot. Well, it could make it potentially a negligible fraction. They’re still farming to make this slurry, and tossing out the excess byproducts. They’re indirectly causing the growing of oats and raising farmed fish (with all that it takes to do that, including dealing with their waste and corpses) and producing maltodextrin (IIRC from wheat or corn) and raising rice in paddies. My point is, you can’t dump together a couple chemicals in a lab and poof, instant food. It comes from farming. And as the linked article points out, there are similar liquid foods already out there. There is a medical-grade version of Ensure, as noted there; I had a brother-in-law who was on it when he was hospitalized in liver failure. There were little containers in his hospital room and it’d get poured down his g-tube. As the article also points out, it’s about the marketing. Ensure is seen to be solely “for” the elderly or the deeply ill. Soylent is “for” the bright geek who can snicker at the name and be all psyched that he can tweak the nutrient balance himself. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/18 "2014-05-07T02:09:22Z")
I read about this a week ago, and am really interested. Only drawback is if I order it I won’t get any until around July. However it seems to be hyopallergenic, so I could use it to test if I have food allergies. Plus the creator says he feels better and has more energy on it (but he has to say whatever makes the product sound good). I don’t know if I’d do 100% soylent, but I could see myself doing 50-80% of my calories from that. Edit: Shit, they jacked up the price. It was $65 for a weeks worth, now they want $85. ---
**Author:** ![Sr\_Siete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@Sr\_Siete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sr_Siete)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/19 "2014-05-07T13:01:13Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > They’re still farming to make this slurry, and tossing out the excess byproducts. They’re indirectly causing the growing of oats and raising farmed fish (with all that it takes to do that, including dealing with their waste and corpses) and producing maltodextrin (IIRC from wheat or corn) and raising rice in paddies. My point is, you can’t dump together a couple chemicals in a lab and poof, instant food. It comes from farming. Yes. Yes. I understand that. I pointed out how it would mean way less farming, not no farming at all. > [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > And as the linked article points out, there are similar liquid foods already out there. There is a medical-grade version of Ensure, as noted there; I had a brother-in-law who was on it when he was hospitalized in liver failure. There were little containers in his hospital room and it’d get poured down his g-tube. > > As the article also points out, it’s about the marketing. Ensure is seen to be solely “for” the elderly or the deeply ill. Soylent is “for” the bright geek who can snicker at the name and be all psyched that he can tweak the nutrient balance himself. Yes. Still can’t see why there’s no room for another one, then. Is the problem that this one is intended for geeks instead of the elderly? ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2014, 1:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808/20 "2014-05-07T13:13:09Z")
> [@Sr\_Siete](#): > > Yes. Yes. I understand that. I pointed out how it would mean way less farming, not no farming at all. I don’t know that we can assume this, frankly. Considering the amount of nutrient supplementation and concentration of food going into this mixture, it may well be a **more** wasteful process. Have the Soylent folks released a document to the contrary, showing an analysis? And as for it being another option - well, yes, it’s another option. My problem was with the slant of the OP or anything that indicates this is something unique, because it’s not. It doesn’t seem to fill any empty niches other than being a geek-marketed product that is going through a beta test. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/possible-food-substitute/687808.md?page=2)